Social enterprise, education and work: entrepreneurialism on the margins

ABSTRACT

This paper examines the rise of social enterprise in relation (and in response) to the contemporary nexus between education and work. Contextualising social enterprise within the broader trend toward private influences in education, the paper explores how diffuse networks driven by both market ideals and a social conscience are shaping new sites of education and work on the margins. Drawing on in-depth research undertaken on the experiences of homeless street press sellers of the social enterprise The Big Issue, I bring focused attention to the lived experience of these transformations in policy and practice. The analysis reveals how entrepreneurialism intersects with precarious poverty to frame sellers’ cultivation of their skills and techniques as enterprising workers on the margins.

KEYWORDS:

• Social enterprise
• homelessness
• work
• education
• margins
• entrepreneurialism

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the McKenzie Postdoctoral Research Fellowship scheme at the University of Melbourne

Notes on contributors

Jesisca Gerrard

Jessica Gerrard is Senior Lecturer in Education, Equity and Politics at the Melbourne Graduate School of Education. She works across the disciplines of sociology and history, with particular interest on: the relationship of education to social change, politics and policy; the shifting - but persistent - experiences of inequality and injustice; and critical theories and methodologies.